


the beast may try to hug you

by ODed_on_jingle_jangle



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Animal Attack, Blood Loss, Blood and Gore, Blood and Violence, Crack, Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, Disembowelment, Gen, Gore, Graphic Description, Hurt No Comfort, Major Character Injury, Parody, Possible Character Death, Tigers, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-01
Updated: 2020-05-01
Packaged: 2021-03-01 21:48:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,138
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23934073
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ODed_on_jingle_jangle/pseuds/ODed_on_jingle_jangle
Summary: At first, Archie thinks it’s a mirage he’s seeing.A white tiger in Pickens Park, its glacial blue eyes peering at him through the early morning mist. Ivory fur stark against the eerie gray of the predawn sky, almost shimmering, cut through by regal black stripes. Majestic, massive paws prowling through the frosted grass.It has to be a mirage, or maybe some kind of lucid dream. Archie blinks, expecting the tiger to disappear. It doesn’t and he realizes this isn’t a dream at all. This is one of the escaped tigers from Bo Exoteric’s private zoo.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 6





	the beast may try to hug you

**Author's Note:**

> Sooo this was something I didn't expect to write. An anon sent me an ask about stupid tags I left on a gifset and unintentionally prompted this. I'm sure they were joking. But it's been a hot min since I've written anything nice and gory, so the idea was...actually pretty tempting?
> 
> I was trying prioritize my Dare Me WIPs since that's such a small fandom, but finally finished Tiger King and could not resist the temptation. So here we are. 
> 
> Please heed the tags. The following content is potentially unsettling and if gore or bodily harm discomforts you, you probably do not want to read it.

At first, Archie thinks it’s a mirage he’s seeing. 

A white tiger in Pickens Park, its glacial blue eyes peering at him through the early morning mist. Ivory fur stark against the eerie gray of the predawn sky, almost shimmering, cut through by regal black stripes. Majestic, massive paws prowling through the frosted grass. 

It has to be a mirage, or maybe some kind of surreal lucid dream from lack of sleep. That’s why he came out here this early to begin with, he couldn’t sleep, he’d hoped a walk in the park would help him work out the restlessness. Archie blinks, expecting the tiger to disappear. 

It doesn’t and he realizes this isn’t a dream at all. This is one of the escaped tigers from Bo Exoteric’s private zoo. Some dude from Greendale who calls himself the Tiger Prince, three of his tigers got out of their enclosures. It was on last night’s news. 

Archie swallows and begins to back away, slowly. Step by step. He never takes his eyes off the tiger and it never takes its eyes off him, probably interested by the only other thing besides itself that’s moving in the still and silent park. Not even the birds are chirping. 

It doesn’t do anything but watch and prowl, at least fifty feet away. As long as he moves slowly, Archie thinks he’ll be okay. 

Then his shoe plunges into a hole— probably a groundhog burrow —and Archie’s ankle gives, he loses his balance, topples. His teeth rattle as he crashes flat on his back, sprawled like a starfish. He scrambles, flinging himself upright, and the tiger that was fifty feet away two seconds ago is suddenly right there, haunches tensing as it readies to pounce. 

It’s like being hit by a truck with fur. 

Archie wildly brings his hands up to protect his face and the beast snarls as its jaws snap around his forearm. Its teeth shred right through the meat, audibly scraping when they meet bone. There is an excruciating pressure and Archie’s screaming, screaming like a runty piglet as the blood spurts forth. 

The tiger jerks its large head and a deafening pop explodes in his ears as his shoulder dislocates. Pure anguish radiates from the socket and Archie screams again, or maybe he never stopped screaming at all, at the mercy of the most breathtaking beast he’s ever seen. It shakes its head like Vegas with a toy, and liquid crimson sprays between its deadly teeth, misting warmly against his face. 

Archie can scarcely draw breath. His ribs are suddenly sticking into him more like splinters and he cannot form coherent thoughts. He knows only snow-blind panic as the tiger swipes its paw, mighty claws shearing through his shirt and skin like tissue paper. A repulsive, wet noise pierces the air and Archie feels this sinister sliding sensation. 

Something thick and coppery burns in his throat. His vision whites out as he’s consumed by a an all encompassing nova of agony. When his vision clears and he looks down at himself and sees, the horrified scream withers in his throat. He is too weak to push it off his tongue, too weak to do anything but tremble under the tiger as he takes in the sight. 

Archie’s insides tumble outside, amid a bay of blood soaking hot into his shorts. Earthworm pink intestines, slick and glistening pearlescent. He can see the fat peeking through the upper lip of the wound, soft and nubbly, a bilious kind of yellow under the glaze of red. 

Suddenly, the tiger relaxes its jaw and Archie’s arm drops to the grass. Pain rockets through the limb, impossibly small against the mire of sheer torment ravaging his torso. The appendage is useless to him anyhow, heavily bleeding and immobile. It’s a ripped up, mushy mess that reminds Archie of red endive leaves, bone exposed like pale ribbons beneath. A dizzying wave of nausea sweeps over him. 

Archie blearily shifts his gaze to the tiger, watches it as it begins pacing in a circle, snow white snout dyed ruby. Tiny droplets bead on its whiskers and drip down from the ends. He looks up into its startlingly stunning eyes and wonders why it attacked him, but cannot hold on to solid thought long to find the answer. 

He looks back down at himself and feebly attempts to put his viscera back inside. They’re slippery and warm in his fingers. But he’s shaking, shaking violently all over and he can scarcely grip. There’s no strength left in him and it’s almost inconceivable that he could be so weak, but he is. 

Archie manages to push a handful of the wormy ropes back under the ragged slash of the deepest wound. There’s an unexpected, intense pressure squeezing tight and painful. It wrings a small whimper from his lips and the tiger’s ears switch back. 

It growls and dives at him again, sinking its teeth into his lower leg. Archie gasps and covers the gaping gouge in his middle with his arm as best as he can as it begins to drag him across the grass. Colors swirl before Archie’s eyes, his grasp on his consciousness a precarious, dwindling thing. It's a fraying thread, and Archie should be more alarmed by this than he actually is.

As he’s tugged to and fro, played with by this gargantuan house cat, Archie isn’t afraid, exactly. He can’t focus enough to feel afraid, all he knows is the brutal pain unlashed through his entire body with every movement. All he knows is that he wants it to stop, God, he would do any-fucking-thing just to make it stop already. 

It’s an unbearable, continuous loop of utter _hurt, hurt, hurt,_ no end in sight. 

Just when he thinks he cannot possibly take any more, the tiger rips a great chunk out of his calf, his leg released from its mouth as the meat squelches free. Blood splatters the grass as the tiger rises on its hind legs, vigorously whipping the messy morsel side to side. 

As disgusting as it is, Archie sees the raw pulp of his own meat in the animal’s mouth and can’t help thinking of the steak fillets his father would throw on the grill when he got some extra money on his paycheck. Thick and juicy and vibrantly red.

The tiger drops back to all fours and trots away, tail bobbing behind it. It doesn’t turn back around. 

Archie can’t get up. He can’t get up and on some level he’s aware that this is not good, this is actually very, very bad. But he’s too exhausted to see straight, breaths shallow and raspy. He curls as much as he can into the cozy warm bed of his own blood, carefully cradling his intestines in his only working hand. 

**Author's Note:**

> Title is from A Softer World: 423
> 
> Probably has typos because it's 5 AM, but I'll go back and fix 'em when I'm more awake.


End file.
